Social Media Users Worldwide: Country Ranking 2020

Social Media Users Worldwide: Country Ranking 2020

We’ve analyzed 190 countries across the world and identified those with the highest and the lowest percentage of active social media users. Curious if your country is one of them? Continue reading to find out.

Data source

At NapoleonCat, we work with data fetched directly from the respective social media platforms’ APIs. We scan data every day to create monthly statistics. For the sake of the study, we analyzed data from November 2020.  

The estimations are based on users’ location declarations and they concern only active users, not the overall number of Facebook accounts. 

The study concerns 190 countries across the world; all of them have populations bigger than 150k. You can access the complete list of the studied countries here

You can check out the statistics for all countries using NapoleonCat’s social media demographics browser. 

The numbers presented in the study may differ by one-tenth from the numbers displayed on www.napoleoncat.com/stats. For the free browser, we round up the population numbers.

Facebook

The most active countries

With the overwhelming result of 93.74%, Brunei Darussalam has the highest percentage of active social media users in the World. 

Facebook users in Brunei Darussalam
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The second and third place in the ranking belongs to Malta (92.64%) and Guam (88.44%). The other countries from the top ten are Libya, Bahrain, Cyprus, Chile, Iceland, Taiwan, and the Maldives.

Top 10

CountryActive Facebook users
Brunei Darussalam93.74%
Malta92.64%
Guam88.44%
Libya84.82%
Bahrain82.75%
Cyprus82.26%
Chile81.92%
Iceland81.48%
Taiwan79.95%
Maldives79.85%

In the case of Facebook, we excluded Qatar and Kuwait, countries that noted 102.14% and 97.30% of active Facebook users, respectively. These numbers exceeded the actual population number either in total (Qatar) or in the number of male users (Kuwait). This disproportion may result from the declarative character of the data. Since migrants constitute a significant proportion of the population both in Qatar and Kuwait, there may actually be more inhabitants than the official statistics claim.

The least active countries

Countries with the lowest percentage of active Facebook users are as follows: Eritrea (0.06%), China (0.24%), and Turkmenistan (1.82%). 

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These results don’t seem surprising. In September 2020, only 8.3% of the entire Eritrean population had Internet access, and the government regularly shuts down access to social media. In China, Facebook and other social media platforms have been banned for years. The social media app is also forbidden in the ex-Soviet Republic, Turkmenistan

At a guess, another country that may shortly join the ranking of the least active Facebook users are the Solomon Islands (currently 18% of active Facebook users), where the social platform was banned last month.

Messenger

The most active countries

When it comes to active Messenger users, the leading country in the world is Malta. There were 353,500 active users of the app in November 2020, which accounts for 80.66% of the entire Maltese population. 

Messenger users in Malta
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With a grand total of 78.46%, the second place belongs to Qatar. The country is a smidgeon ahead of Libya (76.94%), by a little over 1.5 percentage points.

Top 10

Here’s a complete list of the top ten countries with the highest percentage of active Messenger users in the world.

CountryActive users
Malta80.66%
Qatar78.46%
Libya76.94%
Ecuador72.13%
Thailand71.60%
Peru70.94%
Mongolia70.75%
Maldives70.20%
Philippines70.08%
Taiwan69.85%

The least active counties

Countries with the lowest percentage of active Messenger users are Eritrea (0.03%), China (0.05%), and Turkmenistan (0.14%).

Messenger users in China
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Instagram

The most active countries

In the case of Instagram, the numbers aren’t as mind-blowing as for Facebook and Messenger. The photo and video sharing platform has the highest percentage of active users in Brunei Darussalam, which equals 54.95% of the entire population. 

Instagram users in Brunei Darussalam
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The second place goes to Kazakhstan (54.00%), and the third to Sweden (53.43%). Instagram lovers also live in Iceland, Kuwait, Turkey, Cyprus, Chile, Bahrain, and Guam. 

Top 10

CountryActive users
Brunei Darussalam54.95%
Kazakhstan54.00%
Sweden53.43%
Iceland53.41%
Kuwait52.86%
Turkey52.23%
Cyprus51.46%
Chile50.99%
Bahrain50.14%
Guam48.22%

The least active countries

Countries with the lowest percentage of active Instagrammers are Eritrea (0.02%), the Central African Republic (0.15%), and China (0.20%). 

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LinkedIn

The most active countries

LinkedIn differs from the other platforms; its nature is strictly professional. The list of the top ten countries with the highest percentage of active LinkedIn users consists of highly-developed countries. A lap ahead in this ranking is Iceland – the country stormed ahead of the second position (the Netherlands) by over 15%(!).

Linkedin users in Iceland
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The third place in this ranking belongs to the United States (51.17%). The other countries that exhibit high activity on LinkedIn are Singapore, Malta, United Arab Emirates, Ireland, Denmark, Canada, and Australia. 

Top 10

CountryActive users
Iceland69.96%
The Netherlands54.30%
The United States51.17%
Singapore50.23%
Malta49.65%
United Arab Emirates48.09%
Ireland47.67%
Denmark47.22%
Canada46.81%
Australia46.65%

The least active countries

The countries where people are the least active on LinkedIn are Eritrea (0.19%), Chad (0.29%), and South Sudan (0.30%)

Linkedin users in South Sudan
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Bottom line

Social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, and LinkedIn are widely used around the world. The countries that kept featuring in the rankings as the most active were Brunei Darussalam, Iceland, and Malta. In the case of the less active countries, the first place in all categories (Facebook, Messenger, Instagram, and LinkedIn) belongs to an eastern African country, Eritrea. China was present in three out of the four rankings. 

If you want to find out more about the country that you live in (or take a gander at any other country), use our free stats browser

Was your country listed in any of the rankings? Share the study with your countrymen on social media!

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